Wednesday, December 28, 2016

DECORATING FOR CHRISTMAS - MY 'EUREKA' STORY!

Once again, “It’s the most wonderful time of the year”! I simply cannot get
enough of the dry harmattan air, the early morning and evening haze, the
bustling energy seemingly at boiling point across the major markets and
shopping malls as buyers and sellers rush to make last minute transactions. Then there is the awesome food. Speaking of
which, would any Christmas/ New Year’s Day menu be complete without the wonderful
staple of jollof rice? Our mum certainly took no prisoners with her Yuletide jollof
rice. Hers was simply the best, no contest! Add her equally delicious teeth
sinking - lip smacking- finger licking fried fresh chicken, and the world to a
young me then could not have been more perfect! So good was her jollof rice
that you would find me happily scrapping away and eating the burnt ‘bottom pot’
portion of the rice even after a couple of days as though my life depended on
it!

Another fun aspect of this jolly season
is the decorations. Everywhere takes on a new lustre and gaiety with the
beautiful Christmas decorations, especially the Christmas trees. An interesting
incident with my Christmas tree a couple of years back comes to mind. It all
started when a mere couple of weeks after the painstaking decoration of the newly
purchased Christmas tree, my young son decided to test its structural stability
by giving it a hard shove. As it was the season to be jolly, he missed getting
a good spanking by the whiskers. The good thing about his escapade was that I
had serendipitously wound up with two trees for the price of one, even though
the bigger lower portion reminded me of a headless chicken!

Fast forward to Christmas the
following year, and once more it was time to decorate. I stubbornly brought out
the ‘two’ trees as there was no plan for replacement of the tree. The tree was
yet to ‘work’ for the money expended! The decoration results were not
satisfactory. Some tweaking was definitely required. How does one add some
spice to this I am thinking? Looking around, my eyes alight on the set of
traditional pots and sticks that are an integral part of the home decor. The sticks
in question are utilized by Fulani locals of Northern Nigeria for mixing balls
of ground millet with fresh yoghurt to create the popular and refreshing ‘Fura da Nunu’ delicacy.A light bulb moment hit me. Why
not journey through a different decoration route by ‘creating’ different trees
from the combination of the traditional sticks with the severed upper portion
of the Christmas tree?

Voila! On came my creative hat,
and magically seized by the excitement of the Christmas spirit, I worked
feverishly on the new concept. The end result of the decoration cum
installation exercise may be loosely described as an amalgam of indigenous and
foreign elements on the one hand or contemporary meets traditional style.

By far the favourite element of
the entire composition was the ‘Fura da
Nunu’ sticks with its abundance of ornaments, lights and beaded garland.
The scene it evoked, in my estimation was reminiscent of ladies gorgeously
bedecked in jewellery ready to hit one or more of the numerous parties that characterise the season.So in summary, lessons
learnt? Sometimes the best results especially in the world of design happen by
accident.

I trust that your Christmas was "merry and bright!”You can also read the article on BellaNaija

About Me

I am Odigie Agatha who in her spare time fancies that she is global in her outlook yet indigenous in her pride (whatever that means!!) A chartered architect, she firmly believes that life can be optimized through excellent design. Agatha is hung up on fashion, writing and visual arts. Her work-life mantra is “Huge doors are swung on small hinges”. She sometimes sounds sensible on Twitter @Afroagatha, not very often though!!